Head first down a mountain…

My ex and my precious Number 2 son have been in St.Moritz in Switzerland. I got a phone call to say that they had both just done the Cresta Run, a three-quarter of a mile long ice run which drops 514 feet, has 10 very testing corners and gradients from 1 in 2.8 to 1 in 8.7. Apparently, you hurl yourself down the run, headfirst on something resembling a tea-tray at speeds which can reach 80-100km/hour. It’s called (gulp) Skeleton.

By the time I heard about their activities, my ex had a been down once and said it was the scariest 79 seconds of his life, whereas Number 2 son, loved it and went down 7 times – his best time being under 54 seconds. Here is a taster of what it is like.

I am so glad that I didn’t know about this before it happened as I would have been scared to death on their behalf. As it is, a couple of days later, apparently a very experienced chap went down the run and arrived at the end, minus a foot. He had some sort of hideous accident on the way down. I just hope my adrenalin-junkie son thinks twice about doing things like this again but I doubt it. He is very reckless brave and adores winter sports especially skiing. Every time he comes back from skiing trips with his friends, he shows me little videos they take of each other doing scary jumps at great speed. Frightens me to death.

I have no idea where he gets his love of skiing from, as I am the world’s most cautious person and hate skiing (as does my ex) but I suppose we didn’t learn when we were young enough to feel indestructible. Both my sons love it – Number 1 son enjoys snowboarding. I am brilliant at àpres ski though, and have accompanied many of my friends on skiing holidays quite happily :-)

Talking of snow (very dodgy segue coming up) if you remember my polar bear episodes recently, well I came across this and just had to post it.

14 responses to “Head first down a mountain…”

Looks like we have skiing in common, I’m hopeless! But love the après stuff! My last skiing attempt involved mountain rescue in Andorra followed by bed rest for too long and then hobbling! I’ll stick to the drink next time! Having said that I want Manon Lily to have no fear and as soon as she is old enough (currently 7 months) she’ll be up there with daddy! Living only 2 hours from the nearest resort (door to door) we would be stupid to say no!

We used to do some crazy stuff on the hills near where I grew up such as building ramps and jumping over each other on our cheap plastic sleds, but nothing as crazy as the luge or whatever that stuff you listed is called.

I was just having a talk with a friend (in his mid twenties) on my hockey team yesterday morning about the indestructible feeling and how he no longer had it. I told him that it was probably a good thing.

I don’t think I ever had the indestructible feeling – well, maybe just a little! It vanished completely when I had my children. I even became severely afraid of flying. I suppose you feel you need to protect yourself for your children…

I can picture you at the snow….apres yes !!! all for it..Diane :)
as for the kids….worrying=kids (and boys in particular)
what ever happened to the terrible twos???
nice nautical colours !!!
and that art book is sensational !!!

Skiing totally scares me. I like my feet; I’d like to keep both of them. Red Shoe Diaries just aren’t the same if you’re wearing only one hot red shoe.

Anyway….

Anyway, the sugarqueen tagged me for a meme that (while I don’t do all memes I get tagged for) actually is pretty darn cool. There’s no work, it’s just a copy/paste of a list of blogs, and add yours. It’s huge… they’re trying for a record and so if you take part, you’ll end up with tons of backlinks and a fine technorati rating!

I tagged you. Only play if you want though. You don’t actually even have to tag anyone, you can just post the list and tell them to add you to the master list and they will. How’s that for the closest thing to a free lunch?

Your reactions remind me of my mother. My daring antics during my childhood and teens would send shivers down her spine. In the community where we used to stay, we would climb the trees and then jump from roof to roof across an entire block.

I can understand how you feel about this episode. My mother had explained what she felt about such things (after giving me a nice big spanking of course) several times, until i finally got it. That was when my shoulder snapped and put an end to my pitching career. :-)

Thanks for dropping by my site. I realized just now that it was you that originated the 7 things about myself that Angesbiz posted, which was given as a challenge to me by Allan Cockerill. You’re a creative person and multi-talented too (i read your profile). There is enough to do to keep you busy and happy for the rest of your life! Blogging is one of them. And you’ve got great friends that I know of. –Durano, done!